Franklin Cason
University of Florida

Political Vision
         

	The motif of "vision" in Jean-Luc Godard and Anne-Marie 
Mielville's film and video work provides an opportunity to raise the 
question of "political vision." In particular, this essay looks at 
Mielville's shifting visibility and invisibility in critical texts on 
their collaborative and individual work.
	Mielville and Godard have collaborated since at least 1970.
Mielville often co-directs, writes scripts, edits, or works as an art
director on the collaborative pieces. They formed a production company
called Sonimage in 1974. Though that company no longer operates, they
continue to work together and on each other's films. Mielville's films
include: Le Livre de Marie in 1984 (which screened with Godard's Je vous
salut Marie), Mon Cher Sujet in 1988, and Nous Sommes Tous Ici in 1996,
among others.
	Godard's films have often raised questions about gender
representation, misogyny, language, and sound/image relationships. His
films have also raised questions about what a political cinema should 
look like. Godard's famous statement relating "to see" (voir) to
"re-see-ving" (rece-voir) suggests another way to approach these 
questions of sexual politics. It suggests a politics that is not simply 
something one "sees," but also something one "receives." These questions 
around the location of politics in sounds or images brings to the 
foreground the figure of visibility and in this case the visibility of 
Anne-Marie Mielville.
	Mielville and Godard consistently produce complex sound/image
relations explicitly as a way to address complex gender relations. But
often the sound and image relations appear gendered themselves, with 
sound linked to the female side of a heterosexual, binary opposition. 
How does Mielville's "presence" on screen and off screen relate to these
oppositions?  This essay questions the closure of certain critiques of 
Godard's work as "Godard's" work, without intending  to close or to 
solve the problems of gender representation or enunciation in 
Godard/Mielville's films. Instead, I see these as  insistent problems. 
The films and videos of Mielville and Godard inhabit an uncomfortable 
space, insisting that one see what cannot be seen: the unimaginable.